TODAY’S HISTORY LESSON – OCT 24
1531 Bavaria, despite being a Catholic region, joins the League of Schmalkalden, a Protestant group which opposes Charles V.
1648 The signing of the Treaty of Westphalia ends the German Thirty Years’ War.
1755 A British expedition against the French held Fort Niagara in Canada ends in failure.
1836 The match is patented.
1916 Henry Ford awards equal pay to women.
1929 Black Thursday–the first day of the stock market crash which began the Great Depression.
1931 The George Washington Bridge, connecting New York and New Jersey, opened to traffic.
1934 Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, called Mahatma or “Great Soul,” resigns from Congress in India.
1938 The Fair Labor Standards Act becomes law, establishing the 40-hour work week.
1939 Nylon stockings go on sale for 1st time (Wilmington Delaware)
1945 The United Nations comes into existence with the ratification of its charter by the first 29 nations.
1945 Vidkun Quisling, Norway’s wartime minister president, is executed by firing squad for collaboration with the Nazis.
1952 Presidential candidate Dwight D. Eisenhower announces that if elected, he will go to Korea.
1960 All remaining American-owned property in Cuba was nationalized. The process of nationalizing all U.S. and foreign-owned property in Cuban had begun on August 6, 1960.
1973 Yom Kippur War ends.
1973 John Lennon sues US govt to admit the FBI is tapping his phone
1986 Britain broke off relations with Syria after a Jordanian was convicted in an attempted bombing. The evidence in the trial led to the belief that Syria was involved in the attack on the Israeli jetliner.
1987 Bork’s supreme court nomination rejected by senate
1989 Rev Jim Bakker is sentenced to 50 years for fraud
2001 The U.S. House of Representatives approved legislation that gave police the power to secretly search homes, tap all of a person’s telephone conversation and track people’s use of the Internet.
2003 The supersonic Concorde jet made its last commercial passenger flight from New York City’s John F. Kennedy International Airport to London’s Heathrow Airport, traveling at twice the speed of sound.
2008 Many stock exchanges worldwide suffer the steepest declines in their histories; the day becomes known as “Bloody Friday.”
** history.net, onthisday.com, infoplease.com, timeanddate.com, thepeoplehistory.com, on-this-day.com **
